There must be a Simpsons quote for every occasion now.
Ageism
It seems really jarring to me when I read articles/opinions that say “we are a culture that worships youth”. While I would agree that we do seem to worship the appearance of youth (albeit a very particular type - not the pimple clad teenager but the more ambiguous looking adolescent), I experience a culture in which actual young people seem to be hated, derided, called stupid under the guise of “scientific fact”, are undermined and are constantly in the midst of having their rights questioned and revoked.
The kind of rights I am talking about are not just the “right” to drink alcohol, but rather rights to gain meaningful employment, to be paid the same as an “adult” for doing the same job, to use a car, to be able to study post-secondary school, to be allowed to vote.
When I was in school uniform I noticed other forms of discrimination or of prejudice take shape. I was watched closely in shopping centres, I was constantly characterised in certain ways because of my youth. I must be good at computers, I must spend all of my time on myspace (alas, my teenage years were predominantly prior to facebook being available to people outside US Colleges), I must binge drink, I must be carrying around a permament marker because I enjoy vandalising public property, I must spend hours a day on beauty rituals, I obviously would not have any opinions on current events because I obviously refrain from paying attention, I must be barely literate with poor grammar and spelling, I obviously want to skip school, I must be promiscuous, I must have ridiculous taste in music, I am in great need of “hardening up”, I cannot control myself, I am unable to make decisions, etc.
The relationship a culture has with young people seems to be a difficult one. Because while young people are associated with all these bad characteristics, youth is associated with happy memories, purity, “the best time of your life”. Youth is fictionalised and idealised. Yet, I do not care how long ago you were young, there would have still been war, famine, underage drinking, lying, and sexual predators.
Being old obviously is not so great either. Capitalist societies in general are nortoriously bad at pension schemes and letting people rest after a lifetime of difficult and often menial work. (False) Images of youth proliferate the media while the right to die is open to public debate. Families show no guilt towards abandoning their older relatives to homes. The old and senile get locked up together, away from everyone else. Assumptions are made about older people, that they fit in to particular stereotypes, that they are becoming less and less capable to make decisions every day.
Ageism works both ways.
